Puppy Eyes
by Marrilyn
Summary: Rowena refuses to be manipulated. Sam is confused.


"Samuel, that's enough!" Rowena demanded.

Sam frowned, confused. "What did I do?"

"You know bloody well what you did!"

He'd been doing it for months, and she'd been rewarding him by letting him get away with it, generous as she was. She hadn't minded it at first — had actually found it rather cute, endearing — but even the sweetest of things lost their appeal after a while.

Especially when those things happened to entail manipulation.

Sam looked at her as if she'd suddenly grown a pair of horns. Which she would have preferred to being treated like an adversary — still, after all this time. "I don't know what you're talking about."

She sighed. Irritated. Purposely loud to get her point across, seeing as her words obviously weren't able to. "Stop it!" It was a command. An order she demanded he follow, accompanied by a forefinger raised to point directly at him. A threat they both knew she had no intention on making good on (goodness, how _soft_ she'd gotten, not that she'd admit it out loud), but if felt good to let it out, to get it out of her system.

Sam was none the wiser. "Stop what? Rowena, what's going on? What did I do?"

He knew damn well. Rowena wasn't born yesterday; this certainly wasn't her first time being manipulated.

She had to admit, though, his confusion seemed almost genuine. As if he truly didn't know. A crafty wee boy, he was. She expected nothing less from a hunter.

She glared.

Sam flinched as if struck.

The corner of her mouth curled into a smile, a tad too smug to flash at a friend, but what else was she supposed to do?

He was the one who started this game.

"Rowena…" His voice was soft, caring. So bloody friendly a pang of guilt shot through her at her behavior.

Maybe he truly meant nothing by it. Maybe she was looking into things too hard, trying, once again, to find excuses as to why she didn't need a friend, why she was fine all on her own, the same as she'd been for centuries.

Then he did it again.

His lips trembled, brows lowered, expression softened.

He gave her the puppy eyes in all their innocent, adorable glory.

A cunning boy, he was. He didn't deceive her or threaten her — there was no need for such unpleasantries.

All he had to do was look at her like a hurt puppy and she would do whatever he wanted.

Like that time he'd needed help on a particularly difficult wraith hunt. Or when Dean got struck with a curse — _again,_ because of bloody course he had — and Sam, the wannabe witch protege, couldn't break it on his own. Or all those times he'd texted her, and his words, every second one a _please,_ reeked of complete and utter desperation to the point where she could picture the puppy eyes, big and hurt and teary, in her mind and she couldn't get herself to say no.

No more.

Rowena MacLeod was nobody's fool.

Today he was doing the same. She was at the Bunker for a visit, a friendly get-together they engaged in from time to time just to keep in touch. A wee reunion — a family one, though she would never say the word aloud, the connotations still stabbing daggers through her heart. Then Sam's phone rang, and in an instant he was on his feet, frantically explaining the new emergency.

The kind that, apparently, required a witch to resolve it, and wouldn't you know it, there was one right here.

Dean and Castiel were instantly on board, ready for the fight.

Rowena, on the other hand, was not.

She was here on a vacation, if one might call it that. A visit to a friend she'd grown quite fond of (another thing she kept to herself, preferring to let actions speak in place of words).

Besides, every time she lent a hand, it ended badly for her.

Rowena was a lot of things, but she was no masochist.

So, to convince her otherwise, Sam had given her the puppy eyes.

And now he was giving them to her again.

_"Samuel,"_ she warned, all bark, no bite. Another useless threat for their days of animosity were long gone. Sometimes she missed them.

"What? What is it?" Now he was a _concerned_ hurt puppy, far from a good combination when she was trying to stand her ground.

She pushed through it; through the ache in her heart, the fluttering in her belly. She was a grown woman. She would not be swayed by a look, no matter how adorable it was.

Clearing her throat, she said, loud and firm, "I'll not be manipulated."

Sam was flabbergasted. "I'm not manipulating you!"

She scoffed. "Right."

"I'm not! I swear."

He swallowed. Breathed in and out. The puppy stare intensified.

Rowena's lip trembled. She would not give in. She could resist. She _would_ resist. _"Don't!"_

"I'm not doing anything!" Sam insisted.

"You're giving me the bloody puppy eyes!"

He was taken aback by the outburst. "What? I—"

"Don't play dumb with me, boy," she said. "I've been around for a while. I can tell when I'm being manipulated."

Hell, she _had_ manipulated using that same tactic. Granted, her puppy eyes weren't all that sweet, but she had utilized them to accomplish certain goals. They were a useful tool, if one knew how to use them.

Like, for example, Sam Winchester.

"Rowena," he said, "I swear, I'm not manipulating you."

"Really? Then what's with the eyes?"

"I-they're my eyes! I can't change the way I look!"

"Och, that's bollocks and you know it!"

"Sam does have pretty vulnerable eyes," Castiel cut in matter-of-factly.

Sam shot him what Rowena came to refer to as his signature bitchface, which shut the angel up instantly.

"Rowena," he said, voice silk and honey, everything soft and sweet and lovely. His eyes locked with hers; still alike that of a puppy, but there was a rawness in them, an honesty in its purest form, "I promise I'm not trying to manipulate you."

His gaze was too intense, too real to be anything other than the truth. Was it possible that was simply how he was? That he wasn't trying to manipulate her — not on purpose, anyway?

She wanted to argue, to press on the issue further, but how could she when he was looking at her like that? When he was speaking so gently, so kindly? When he was being so bloody lovely?

He'd never looked at her like that when they were enemies, she remembered. Had never shown her kindness, tenderness — not until she'd changed and allowed him to see there was more to her than the stone-heartedness that met the eye.

Sam was a good man. He wouldn't take advantage of her. Not after everything they'd been through. After they'd bonded over shared trauma and had learned their fate. He was the first person who was able to look past her cold exterior and get to know the person — the woman, vulnerable, frightened — hiding behind it.

He was the first person to offer her redemption.

He wouldn't jeopardize their friendship (the word still tasted weird on Rowena's tongue) over something as petty as manipulation.

Rowena's cheeks flushed the ripe red of cherries. She huffed.

Sam laid a hand on her shoulder, a warm, peace-offering gesture. "I'm not." If the puppy eyes swore on it, who was she to say otherwise? "Will you help us? Please?"

"Fine."

What other choice did she have? Besides, it wasn't like she had anything else to do.

Before she did anything, though, there were some ground rules. "But, for goodness' sake, stop looking at me like that." Because it was messing with her emotions. Because it made her heart do things it hadn't done in centuries, not since she was that bright-eyed, filthy tanner's daughter with stars in her eyes and dreams of a future that would never be. "You're a grown man, Samuel. Start acting like it."

_Stop making me feel things. I don't do feelings._

Without waiting for a response, she started gathering her things.

Sam stood still as a statue, looking at her as if she'd slapped him. At the very least the puppy eyes were gone.

"I told you, man," Dean said with a snicker, earning him a bitchface of his own.

Rowena sighed.

These boys would be the death of her.


End file.
